The day began as a regular Tuesday, one of those long Tuesdays that has a school board meeting annexed to the end of the school day that usually drags on late into the evening.
There has been quite a bit of excitement all around Conakry these past two weeks with everyone heating up to tonight's first opening soccer game of the season when the national Guinean team would play against Mali. Conakry had basically been taken over by soccer mania and the excitement had risen to an almost combustible fever pitch. Guinean flags were flaunted everywhere. Every car, bus, van and goat displayed a Guinean flag on it. The colorful spectacle of flags combined with the palpable exhilaration in the air was quite a contrast to the otherwise sad and bleak Conakry. Soccer is big here.
Tonight’s game was scheduled to begin at 7PM. It would be an ‘away’ game, so everyone, and especially every respectable Guinean, would be glued to his or her radio or TV at 7PM. Everyone except us that is, because we had a meeting to attend.
School Board meetings usually last a couple of hours. We had decided to start the meeting earlier than usual because some of the members were hoping to make it home on time to watch part of the game. We were 90 minutes into the meeting when suddenly phones around the table started chiming. It is important to note here that most people around that table were people working for big companies, not your average Amway selling Joe Bloes, but rather worldly movers and shakers, you know, the kind of people in whose presence there never seems to be a dull moment. These guys work for big companies, make big decisions, manage big things, make big money, are chauffeured in big cars, and some of them even have big burly bodyguards that shadow them all the time.
So the meeting is interrupted by these four phones ringing almost simultaneously, including mine. My call was from our business manager who had left the meeting at 7PM, shrewdly figuring that she would avoid the traffic and the masses in the streets if she left at the beginning of the game when most people were glued to their radios or TVs. I immediately sensed panic in her voice. She was imprisoned in her vehicle; her car surrounded by a mob of very angry people; she could not move up, nor back up; and she was understandably scared out of her wits. I attempted to calm her down, but was stumped for words that could reassure her. I asked her where she was and told her that I would talk to the people here and see what we could do to get her out of harms way.
As I shut down my phone, I looked up at my three colleagues who had also ended their phone conversations at the same time as I, and they all had the same distressed look on their faces. Granted, my face was probably more distressed looking than theirs. I told them about my phone call; they told me about theirs. They had gotten calls from their security people advising them that much of Conakry was presently a riot zone. What had caused people to riot? Electricity throughout much of the city was out, which in fact is not that unusual, on a usual evening. However, tonight, of all nights, when 2 million people had been anticipating and lathering up for the past month to this game and were about to finally coalesce around their TVs or radios as one united proud nation, the power runs out 10 minutes before game time, and the city turns black, well... people understandably get angry, like really angry, like really really lets-go-throw-rocks-and-burn-tires angry.
Two of the guys were told by their security people that their neighborhoods were presently war zones and for a while, out of bounds. It was suggested that they stay put until much later after the end of the game when things would hopefully have died down. I was offered a ride home by one of them, whom I will refer to as T from now on for the sake of internet privacy. T just happened to not only have the biggest car, but also the biggest, burliest body guard. I took T up on his offer. T then invited the two other stranded guys to follow us with their cars and we would safely convoy our way to his house, which was in a not too riotous neighborhood, and where we could sit out the riot over beers, and even perhaps watch the game on his really big big-screen TV. Sounded like a good plan to me.
I sent our driver Bivan home with the car, and got into T’s big car, which when next to our car, seemed like a really big black armored vehicle, which is basically what it was. I felt safe. I felt even safer when T got into the back seat of the car next to me and instructed his big burly body guard, who was sitting in the front passenger’s seat, to roll down his window and take out his gun and set it on his lap where people could see it. This again, was a really, really big gun, on the lap of a really, really big bodyguard. Yup, we were ready to rumble...let the convoy begin.
Our ride back to T’s house was uneventful, which was kind of a let down. T’s driver snaked his way through back streets to avoid any potential mobs. We finally got to T’s neighborhood, which had electricity, hence no need to burn tires in the streets or throw stones at passing cars to display one’s anger at life. I have to admit, I was kind of disappointed at the no-action ride to T’s house. I guess I just wanted to see how those rioters would react to our armed to the teeth burly body guard, literally riding shotgun. A bit of my macho-testosterone-laden-been watching-too-much-TV dark side temporarily rearing its ugly head...I guess.
At T’s house, we ended up waiting out the riot, watching the game, drinking beer and eating Pringles. It was a moment. It was decided that the best time to leave T’s house to get back to our respective homes was to leave 10 minutes before the game ended, again shrewdly figuring that most rioters would be so taken up by the end of the game that there would be a temporary lull in the rock throwing and burning tires, giving us time to safely get into our respective domiciles.
As we got back outside to our cars, we were suddenly met by this battalion of soldiers, impressive army guys with guns in their hands. Turns out T had summoned them (T has been living and working in Conakry for the past 18 years, therefore he knows people, and he especially knows who to call when faced with a precarious situation like the one we were in). It was decided that I would go home with the big black armored car and the big burly armed bodyguard, while the battalion of impressive army guys would escort the two other guys‘ car to their house. Is there no justice? All I had was a big burly armed bodyguard, my buddies had a whole battalion of soldiers. Oh well, maybe next riot.
Got home safely. Bivan, our school driver who I had sent home earlier, showed up at our door around 10PM, telling us that he was not able to make it home because of the rioting, and therefore would sleep in the car. We gave him some blankets and some leftover chicken, for which he was very grateful. So after a rather eventful day, we finally retreated to our bed, Bivan retired to the comfort of the school car, and Conakry continued to burn into the wee hours of the morning. Guinea lost to Mali 1-0.
And that’s the kind of Tuesday it was.
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